News headlines in April 2011

More than two months since former president Hosni Mubarak was forced from office after 30 years in power, local political figures and analysts warn of 'counterrevolutionary elements' still working behind the scenes to thwart Egypt's ongoing transition to democracy.

An annual meeting of Asian finance ministers and central bank governors in Hanoi is set to address the fate of 64 million people in the region on the brink of extreme poverty. They are the worst affected by soaring food prices, which have hit record highs in the first two months of this year.

Is coca a dangerous drug that should be tightly regulated, or an essential part of Andean indigenous people's cultural and medicinal heritage? Or perhaps both?

In the aftermath of the anniversary of the worst nuclear disaster in history, Ukrainian authorities have pledged not to abandon those still in need of assistance. But many of the country’s policies may be increasing the risk of a new catastrophe.

The Confebask business association in northern Spain reported that it received a letter from the armed Basque separatist group ETA, announcing the cancellation of 'the revolutionary tax' that it has charged businesses over the last 40 years.

The special session on Syria held by the United Nations Human Rights Council Friday agreed on neither an international mission of enquiry, as originally foreseen, nor a lower level fact-finding mission - only a mission by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Despite being at the forefront of sweeping changes taking place in the country, the lives of the majority of Yemeni women are restricted to early marriage, motherhood and serving husbands, according to a new study by Women Without Borders (WWB), a Vienna based public relations and advocacy platform for women’s voices around the world.

The countries of Latin America are working slowly to overcome barriers in the fight against the often brutal violence suffered by children and adolescents in their homes, schools, workplaces or juvenile detention centres.

The death penalty is in limbo in several states since the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency confiscated several states' supplies of sodium thiopental (ST), a key drug used in lethal injections, and as the supply of the drug to the U.S. grows even tighter.

On April 28, former US President Jimmy Carter and three former European heads of state landed in Seoul after travelling to Pyongyang to help reopen dialogue between the two Koreas. Known as the Elders, they carried this message to the leaders of South Korea and the United States: "Chairman and General Secretary Kim Jong-il said he is willing and the people of North Korea are willing to negotiate with South Korea or with the United States or with the six powers on any subject any time and without any preconditions," writes Christine Ahn, Executive Director of the Korea Policy Institute and a member of the National Campaign to End the Korean War.